Football | Champions League

PSG still trailing in Real's financial shadow

Paris Saint-Germain smashed the world-record transfer fee last year to sign Neymar from Barcelona, but despite the big spending driven by their Qatari owners, the French club still lag behind Real Madrid in terms of financial muscle.

Reigning European champions Real (647.6 million euros) made almost 200 million euros more in turnover than PSG last year, according to Deloitte.

The Spanish giants host Unai Emery's side in the Champions League last 16, first leg on Wednesday, but can the Ligue 1 leaders ever expect to match their illustrious opponents off the pitch, never mind on it?

Real - unrivalled global brand

In the world of club football, Real have always stood alone in terms of sporting achievements as record 12-time European champions, but in recent years they have also dominated financially.

The Madrid club posted the world's highest annual turnover for a decade until recently being overtaken by Manchester United, fuelled by the Premier League's astronomical TV rights.

Real's prosperity in the 21st century was born from president Florentino Perez's 'Galactico' transfer strategy of paying whatever it took to buy the world's biggest stars.

"If Real have the best players in the world in each position, then revenue won't be a problem," Perez told AFP in 2016.

"In terms of reputation, transfers of 400 million euros in total for Neymar and (Kylian) Mbappe put (Paris) on the map very quickly," he said.

"This takes years to achieve normally, but they managed to do it quickly."

PSG still have a staggering amount of cash available to splash on players, with last month's 'Soccerex Football Finance 100' study ranking them above Real financially when taking into consideration money in the bank and potential investment from owners.

Perhaps the biggest reason Real have an edge over PSG, though, is because of on-field success, as the French side have still never even reached a Champions League final.

Neymar, Mbappe and co could go a long way towards changing the balance of power by beating their illustrious opponents at the Bernabeu on Wednesday.